Around 2000, the term "specialty coffee" began to appear in the coffee industry, referring to a group of coffee beans that are high value, high quality and different from commercial coffee beans. I have been working in the coffee industry for many years and have been thinking about this question from different angles: What is specialty coffee? What is good coffee?

Case 1: During the Chinese New Year, I bought two bottles of Rose Coffee Ethiopian coffee beans (specialty coffee). My father thought it tasted good, but my mother thought it was very bitter. (My father often drinks instant coffee, but my mother doesn't like coffee)

Case 2: When I first entered the coffee industry, the store manager gave me a cup of espresso. It was my first cup of freshly ground coffee. The bitter and stimulating flavor immediately after I took a sip made me doubt the "chocolate flavor" mentioned by the store manager. At this stage, I felt that latte with sugar was the best coffee.

Case 3: A cupping activity was held in a store. There were coffee beans from three continents: Brazil, Costa Rica, Colombia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Yunnan. The customers who signed up included professional baristas and consumers who had just started drinking coffee. After the cupping, everyone was asked to share which coffee they thought was good. The results varied greatly: professional baristas mostly liked African coffee beans, while consumers who had just started drinking coffee preferred the softer Brazilian beans.

So, what is specialty coffee? What is good coffee? I think the cognitive gap between consumers and professional baristas is an important factor in promoting the continuous development of the domestic coffee market.

From the consumer's perspective: coffee that you think tastes good is good coffee.

From the professional perspective of coffee: good coffee must be associated with the word “fine”.

According to the definition of the Specialty Coffee Association of America, specialty coffee must have these six characteristics:

1. Suitable planting environment;
2. Exquisite treatment method;
3. Good transportation and storage methods;
4. Suitable roasting degree of coffee beans;
5. Proper brewing method;
6. Certification by international professional organizations;

01. Suitable planting environment

The environment has a crucial impact on coffee. Coffee trees are also very picky about their growing environment, which is why coffee trees cannot be grown in areas outside the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn.

• If the temperature is too high, the coffee's resistance to pests and diseases will decrease, causing it to become sick and die.
• The temperature is too low, the coffee trees grow too slowly, and there is a potential risk of them freezing to death.

The area between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn is the most suitable for growing coffee, but high-quality coffee beans are often grown in high-altitude areas in the equatorial region, such as Ethiopia in Africa, Brazil in South America, and Indonesia in Asia.

The higher the altitude at which the coffee is grown, the better the quality.

High-quality coffee can often grow in areas above 2,000 meters, where sufficient sunlight during the day is conducive to the growth of coffee and there are fewer pests and diseases, so that coffee trees do not need to release more caffeine to protect themselves from pests and diseases. The cool climate at night will slow the growth rate of coffee, allowing coffee to absorb more sugar. Such coffee tastes better in acidity and sweetness, less bitterness, varied and complex flavors, and a long-lasting and strong aftertaste.

02. Exquisite processing method

After coffee farmers pick and collect coffee berries one by one, they are sent to coffee processing plants for processing and treatment on the same day. The purpose is to select a processing method suitable for the variety based on the characteristics of the coffee beans, so as to maximize the release of the coffee's high-quality flavor.

Common coffee processing methods include: sun drying, washed, honey and semi-washed. The difference lies in the degree of retention when removing the coffee fruit skin. The different degrees of retention lead to different processing methods and final flavors.

• Washed processing method: high acidity, low sweetness, high cleanliness;
• Semi-washed processing method: medium acidity, low sweetness, medium cleanliness;
• Honey processing method: lower acidity, medium sweetness, lower cleanliness;
• Natural drying method: low acidity, high sweetness, low cleanliness;

Depending on the coffee processing method, we can also choose coffee beans that suit our taste: If you like acidic coffee, choose the washed method; If you like clean coffee, choose the washed method; If you like sweet coffee, choose the natural drying method; If you like coffee with a balanced flavor, choose semi-washed or honey processing.

03. Good transportation and storage

After coffee is processed, it usually needs to be stored in a warehouse for several months. The main reason is to reduce the moisture content of the coffee beans to a consistent level, and the temperature and humidity of the warehouse have strict requirements:

When storing coffee beans at home, you need to pay attention to the following: avoid light, heat, moisture and oxygen.

04. Suitable roasting degree of coffee beans

After the green coffee beans are transported to the destination, they need to be roasted into mature beans using a coffee roaster. The choice of roasting degree will completely affect and change the flavor of a coffee bean.

Coffee roasting methods can be roughly divided into three categories: light roasting, medium roasting and deep roasting. The three categories can be further divided into eight subcategories.

1. Light baking: Baking requires low temperature and short time;

• Lightly roasted: The sour taste is very obvious, the aroma is thin, the sour taste is strong, and the other flavors are weak;
• Cinnamon roasting: mostly sample roasting, because the color is close to cinnamon, so it is called cinnamon roasting;

2. Medium baking: Baking requires higher temperature and longer time;

• Medium roast: bright sour taste, softer taste, bright sour taste, suitable for single origin coffee such as hand brewing;
• Highly roasted: The sourness and bitterness are obvious, the beans are dark brown, and the acidity and bitterness are relatively balanced;
• City Roast: bitter and heavy taste, the sour taste disappears and the bitterness is also lower;

3. Deep baking: Baking requires the highest temperature and the longest time;

• Dark City Roast: no sourness, slightly bitter, dark chocolate color, no sourness, slightly bitter;
• French baking: bitter taste, dark color, oily surface, bitter taste;
• Italian roasting: more bitter, the darkest roasting degree, almost black, with oil on the surface, strong aroma, and more bitter;

05. Proper brewing method

There are many kinds of coffee making equipment, which can be roughly divided into fully automatic (fully automatic coffee machine), semi-automatic (semi-automatic coffee machine) and manual machines (various manual coffee making equipment).

Fully automatic and semi-automatic are more suitable for making Italian milk coffee, which is a combination of milk and coffee. Specialty coffee aims to taste the most original flavor of coffee and appreciate the difference in flavor brought by each step of the process from seed to cup.

Therefore, the equipment suitable for making fine coffee is mainly manual equipment, among which the hand-brewed pot, siphon pot, Aeropress and French press pot are the main ones. The coffee brewed by different utensils is also different. Let's experience the mystery.

06. Certification by international professional organizations

The Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA) is the most authoritative and credible coffee certification organization in the world. Therefore, any coffee beans on the market with the "Specialty Coffee Association of America" ​​(SCAA) certification are of superior quality and are considered "specialty coffee among specialty coffees." Similar organizations include the European Specialty Coffee Association, Panama's "Best of Panama" award, and the Specialty Coffee Association of Japan.

However, there are also many coffee beans that are of good quality but cannot be evaluated by professional institutions through normal channels. This is because among the more than 70 coffee producing countries in the world, the vast majority of high-quality coffee producing countries are economically very backward countries in the world, such as Ethiopia, Kenya, Burundi in Africa, Guatemala, El Salvador in America, East Timor and Papua New Guinea in the Asia-Pacific region, all of which are producers of high-quality specialty coffee in the world. However, domestic information sources are too single, and coffee farmers are almost without the Internet. Their biggest hope is to ensure their livelihoods, and they don’t have much money to send to the United States or other institutions for evaluation.

At this time, some "public welfare organizations" emerged, such as the Rainforest Alliance, the Fair Trade Organization, and organic certification organizations in various countries and regions. Many of these organizations actively contact coffee farmers for certification, and some also require a small fee. Coffee beans certified by these public welfare organizations can be sold at a higher price, and coffee farmers can get better income.

Different people have different tastes

In the coffee industry, there is also a "consumer contempt chain". People who drink single-origin coffee look down on those who drink Italian coffee; those who drink Italian coffee look down on those who drink instant coffee; those who drink hand-brewed coffee look down on those who drink fully automatic coffee machines; those who drink American coffee look down on those who drink Italian milk coffee...

But in the final analysis, no matter who makes coffee or how expensive the equipment used, it is essentially a drink. As a drink, everyone's needs and tastes will be different. Moreover, there is no fixed method or formula for coffee: a cup of latte will taste different in ten coffee shops. Even instant coffee is delicious as long as you like it, and no one is superior to another.